Infinity + One (26 page)

THE CONVENIENCE STORE in Joplin, Missouri where we dropped William was kitschy and fun, a little of this and a little of that, and I found myself lingering over a display of books, wondering what Finn liked to read when his head wasn’t filled with numbers. I’d never been much of a reader. The words in my head always came with a tune, and I wondered if books would hold my interest longer if they were written in rhyme, so I could sing them.

My hands ran over the titles of the books, cookbooks that boasted “a taste of Missouri,” romance novels from “local authors,” and even a copy of
Huckleberry Finn
, the cover a picture of a boy and a black man who looked a little like William without all the hair, gliding down the Mississippi. I had to have it and snickered at the thought of Finn’s face when I asked him to sign it. I started to turn away in anticipation of that face, when something caught my eye.

On the top shelf of the display, propped so the cover could be seen, was a flimsy, dusty book that looked like someone had produced it on a home printer. It was the title that caught my eye, and I pulled the booklet from the shelf, my eyes on the picture of a couple dressed in 1930s clothing, smiling at the camera, the girl perched on the left arm of the guy, clutching him as he clutched her, his left arm holding her aloft, almost in a childlike pose, which showed his strength and her affection.

He held a white hat in his right hand, which partially obscured the license plate of the car behind them. Above the picture were the words
Bonnie & Clyde
. Below the picture, the words
Their Story
. It was simple and unsophisticated. It wouldn’t take me more than an hour to read it from cover to cover, twice. But I was spellbound by that picture, by the couple that shared our names. I snatched up all the copies on the shelf, a thin stack of them, as if it were our story and the pages held our secrets.

The cashier seemed surprised that I needed six copies of the glorified pamphlet, but was “glad to see them go,” as they’d been sitting on that same shelf for as long as she’d worked there, which would be ten years in May.

“It’s supposed to be pretty accurate, though. The gal that put that book together was a relation or distant cousin of Clyde Barrow’s, I guess. She was real protective of those two—kind of obsessed with them, actually. She said theirs was a love story first and foremost, and people got distracted by the violence. She’s gone now, but I didn’t have the heart to throw them away.”

The friendly cashier bagged my purchases, which included some lunch to replace the sandwiches William had eaten, as well as a couple of homemade suckers and a stack of pralines because I had a sweet tooth and wasn’t in the mood to deny it any longer. Gran had made me ultra-self-conscious about everything I ate because “being thin was part of the job description.”

“You know, you should drive by Bonnie and Clyde’s hideout while you’re here, since you’re buyin’ the book and all. It’s on your way outta town. It’s just off Highway 43.” She indicated the street we were on. “Head south and take a right on 34
th
street. There’s a big liquor store on the corner, you can’t miss it. The house is between Joplin and Oakridge Drive, on your right.” She took one of the books out of my bag and turned a few pages, finding what she was looking for. She tapped a picture and showed it to me.

“Here it is. It looks just the same. They stayed here in Joplin back in 1933, according to this here,” she quoted. “You can’t go inside anymore, but you can see it from the road.” I thanked her again and strolled out to the car with my finds and climbed in beside Finn. His eyes were focused on a police car parked at another pump, his brow furrowed.

“Finn?” I asked, not liking the look on his face.

“That cop has just been sitting in his car since he pulled up. No big deal, but he keeps looking over here, and a second ago he picked up his radio and started talking into it, still looking at me the whole time.”

I shrugged. Finn was nervous around the police, understandably. But we hadn’t done anything and I was eager to see Bonnie and Clyde’s hidey hole.

“Let’s go. Maybe he just thinks you’re hot.”

“Most likely he thinks this car’s hot—as in stolen.”

“But it isn’t . . . so we don’t have anything to worry about.” But I thought about the scene at the bank and didn’t argue with him.

Finn pulled away from the pump and eased out into the intersection, heading south down Main Street. He kept his eyes on the rearview mirror, as if expecting to be followed by the police car still parked at the pump. I was too busy looking around me, making sure we didn’t miss 34
th
street. I’d been part of a group of country singers that had raised money to help rebuild Joplin after the tornado hit in 2011. Sections of Joplin had been completely leveled by the twister. In fact, it had headed straight down 32
nd
street, but the town was already thriving again, building going on in every direction. The old gas station hadn’t been new, however, and I marveled at the sheer randomness of a storm that would take out one business and leave another, take one life and spare another. It was the randomness that made it fair, I supposed.

“Turn right!” I yelped, realizing I should have given Finn a better heads up. He turned without hesitation, and our back wheels squealed a little. The car behind us honked, but I laughed, and Finn lost the worried look he’d had since spotting the police car.

“What are we doing?” he asked.

“We’re sightseeing.” I peered down the street, doubtfully. It felt like spring in Joplin. Late winter could be like that in the south. The sun was shining, the trees looked like they were thinking about sporting some green, and 34
th
street looked sleepy and content, hardly the place where a shoot-out with a pair of bank robbers cost two policemen their lives eighty years earlier.

“Between Joplin and Oakridge on the right,” I said, repeating the directions the woman at the gas station had given me. “There!” I pointed at a boxy, light-colored stone home facing the street. A pair of large windows sat above two garage doors, just like in the picture. It was neat and well-kept, pretty even, with a side yard. But there was no sign indicating it was a historical landmark. There was a chain link fence around the yard, and the houses around it looked lived in—a tetherball pole with a faded ball stood in the yard of the house next door. It was just a demure house on an old street in a quiet neighborhood. I looked down at the book again to make sure we were in the right place.

“What are we looking at?” Clyde asked, parking in front of the two garage doors and staring up at the big windows above us.

“
The infamous bank robbers lived over this garage for less than two weeks before the April 13, 1933 shootout with the authorities, who had been tipped off about the apartment hideout. Two officers died, and Bonnie and Clyde escaped,”
I read out loud from the pamphlet.

“Here? This is their hideout?” Finn marveled and looked around once more at the surrounding homes. A boy of about nine or ten pedaled by on his bike, eyeing us curiously.

I lifted up the little paper book and showed him the cover. “I bought this at the gas station. The lady there thought I might want to see their love nest.”

Clyde took the book from my hands and opened it to the first page.

“
You’ve read the story of Jesse James,

Of how he lived and died

If you’re still in the need

Of something to read,

Here’s the story of Bonnie and Clyde
,” he read.

Apparently, Bonnie was a poet. She’d written two poems, stories really, and I could imagine them set to some bluegrass music, a little harmonica between the stanzas, maybe a fast fiddle in the getaway scenes. One poem was called “Suicide Sal,” about a woman who had loved a man who betrayed her, landing her in jail, and the other, “The Story of Bonnie and Clyde.” I started to read as Finn drove, leaving the inauspicious hideaway and merging up onto I-44, Joplin at our backs, but Bonnie and Clyde still very much with us as we headed toward Oklahoma.

I read for almost an hour, the account very detailed and elaborate, and obviously written by someone who cared for Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker. I thought it was funny that Clyde’s middle name was really Chestnut—not Champion like some accounts claim—and resolved to add that to my list of nicknames for Finn. He only volunteered comment once, when I read about Clyde’s time in prison.

“Clyde was sent to Eastham Prison farm in April 1930. While in prison, Barrow beat to death another inmate who had repeatedly assaulted him sexually. This was Clyde Barrow's first killing. A fellow inmate said he ‘watched Clyde change from a schoolboy to a rattlesnake.’

“Paroled in February of 1932, Barrow emerged from Eastham a hardened and bitter criminal. His sister Marie said, ‘Something awful sure must have happened to him in prison, because he wasn't the same person when he got out.’"

Finn reached over, grabbed the book, and tossed it out the window. I watched it tumble behind the car before turning to Finn in astonishment.

“I wanted to see what happened next!”

“We don’t need to read that, do we Bonnie?”

“But . . .” I protested. I had several more copies. It wasn’t like I couldn’t pull another one out. “It’s fascinating.”

“I don’t find it especially fascinating,” he said, his eyes straight ahead.

“Oh.” I felt sick, and we sat in silence as I tried to figure out what to say. He glanced over at me eventually. I guess I was too quiet.

“You look like you’re going to cry, Bonnie Rae.”

“Did that happen to you, Finn?” I asked, sorrier than I’d ever been in my whole life. Finn cursed and shook his head, like he couldn’t believe I’d just come right out and asked him. But I didn’t know how else to do it. And because I cared about him, I had to know.

“No. It didn’t. But it happens. All the time. And it was the thing I was the most afraid of. The thing I was most desperate to avoid. So I feel for him even though I don’t like him very much.”

“Who, Clyde?”

“Yeah. Clyde. It makes a lot more sense why he lived his life the way he did after that.”

I pulled another copy of the book out of my grocery sack. Finn just shook his head, but he didn’t protest.

“Clyde had another inmate chop off two of his toes in an effort to get released from hard labor. Instead, he got paroled.”

“Holy shit.”

“He was desperate.” I couldn’t imagine that kind of desperation. Or maybe I could. I don’t know. Cutting my hair was one thing, cutting my toes off was another thing altogether.

“And what did I tell you about desperate? Desperate people make bad choices.”

I had nothing to say in response, and Finn didn’t interrupt as I continued on with the story, though he listened intently with his arms crossed over the wheel, his eyes on the road and occasionally on me until I read the final page.

“Bonnie’s mother refused to have Bonnie buried with the man that led her daughter into a life of crime. So although they died together, and Bonnie predicted they would be buried side by side, they were buried apart, in two different cemeteries in West Dallas.” Then I read the last sentence, a stanza from Bonnie’s poem.

To few it’ll be grief –

To the law a relief

But it’s death for Bonnie and Clyde.

“They robbed banks and killed nine police officers,” I said, looking out over the wide open space, serene in the noonday sun, so unlike the dense, tree-lined freeways we’d started our journey with.

“Yep,” Finn said.

“They weren’t good people,” I added, but even I heard the reluctance in my voice.

“No.”

“So why the fascination? Why are movies made about them, museums built for them? Why did this little old lady—I read the author’s name off the bottom of the booklet—love them so much?”

Finn’s gaze was sober and probing, like he was waiting for me to come to a bigger conclusion. His eyes were a bright, sky blue, completely opposite from my own, and when he leveled them at me my mind tripped and my thoughts went spilling out in all directions. I forgot my own question for a minute. But then Finn looked away from me, out his window, but his jaw was tight.

“You tell me, Bonnie. Why the fascination?”

I studied Finn’s profile, the line of his jaw and the firm set of his lips. A few strands had worked their way free of his smooth tail and brushed his lean cheeks. I wanted to brush them back so that I could touch him. It was strange how I always wanted to touch him. And he tried so hard to be untouchable.

“Because they loved each other.”

The answer came out of nowhere. Or maybe it came from instinct or from that place in the human heart that knows the truth before we tell our heads what to think, but I felt the truth in the words even as I spoke them.

“They loved each other. And love is . . . fascinating.” I almost whispered the words, they felt so intimate. I was confessing my own feelings under the flimsy guise of discussing two long-dead outlaw lovers. And I was pretty sure he knew it.

“There’s that word again. Fascinating. You find them fascinating. But they were criminals.” Finn’s bright eyes were probing again, looking for something from me.

“But that’s not all they were.” Again, the truth resonated like a gong in my heart. “People aren’t one dimensional. They were criminals. But that’s not all they were,” I repeated.

“I’m an ex-con.”

“But that’s not all you are.”

“Oh yeah?” Finn asked, his eyes heavy and troubled. “But how long will I be fascinating to you, Bonnie?”

I wanted to laugh. And then it made me mad. Was he serious? “People who don’t even know me claim to love me, Finn, and people who
should
love me are more interested in claiming me. Maybe I should be asking you that question.”

“I’m a felon. You’re a superstar. Enough said.”

“But that’s not
all
I am!” I said, angrily pulling my hand free from his.

“So you and I, what are we? What else? Tell me,” he reached out and grasped my chin with the hand that wasn’t on the wheel, making me look at him as he looked between me and the lonely road, demanding an answer.